1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a semiconductor device having a so-called chip-size package structure in which a size thereof is equal to an integrated circuit (IC) chip, and to a method of manufacturing the chip-size package.
2. Description of the Related Art
IC packages called chip-size packages have been manufactured in such a manner that they are formed after the step of separating their IC chips from each other.
Conventional IC packages necessarily have a certain amount of marginal portion such as to enable ICs to be packed therein, and are substantially larger in size than the ICs although they are called xe2x80x9cchip-size packagesxe2x80x9d.
Moreover, the process of manufacturing such IC packages is complicated and requires a high manufacturing cost, and the manufacturing period is long.
In view of the above-described problem, an object of the present invention is to provide a method of manufacturing IC packages in the wafer state, and an IC package having the same size as its IC chip. That is, bumps are bonded to electrode pads of chips on a wafer, a protective material is applied thereto, and bump portions are exposed by a masking technique. Thereafter, the wafer is cut along scribe lines to complete IC packages.